By Dave Montalbano

AdventuresOfCinemaDave.com

We are approaching the four-year anniversary of the September stock market crash. While the market has rebounded with a better rate of return than the 2009 Federal Job Stimulus Bill, Hollywood Producers have created several movies about this subject, most notably Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

While the Manhattan media has generated some buzz, Arbitrage opens this weekend locally. The film reteams Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon as successful robber barons from Wall Street who are nearing retirement. As we have learned from the Greek family tragedies, a simple character flaw can undermine the family dynasty.

Limping along at the box office is ParaNorman, a stop-motion animated film. This poorly-marketed movie is a gem of a monster movie that has generated much positive word of mouth. If you get a chance, see ParaNorman on the big screen before it is too late; it is the best animated film of the year.

The film opens in a New England neighborhood that looks eerily similar to that of Haddonfield, Elm Street and Chrystal Lake. Young Norman is a freaky kid who sees dead people. Since Norman is basically a nice kid, he gets along with the ghosts that haunt his neighborhood.

Enter the scary and bloated Mr. Prenderghast, who warns Norman about the 300-yearold curse of the Old Witch. Like Norman, Mr. Prenderghast sees ghosts and has failed to warn the town of the Old Witch’s revenge.

With such a Gothic setup, ParaNorman succeeds by being contemporary fable. Frightening at first, zombies rising from their graves are less scary than mob rule inspired by reality television shows like Jersey Shore and Honey Boo Boo.

Besides telling an entertaining story for both children and adults, ParaNorman succeeds by presenting a fable worthy of Aesop. We learn that the cause of the Old Witch’s curse is a contemporary problem that has been the plague of all public schools. ParaNorman can provide a great resource for a lesson about bullying.